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Tuesday, May 6, 2014

Pittsburgh Marathon Weekend: Day 2 - 5K

So Saturday morning I woke up at 6am to meet a good group of
runners for a shakeout run, the Pittsburgh Marathon 5K. I was super excited to
get to run this race because this was my race back to running in 2012. I was
excited to enjoy it with some new friends.

I ended up meeting Jeff in the parking garage and we walked
over to Chelsea’s apartment. This was central meeting location for the day. Sarah
and Matthew joined not too long after, then Kelsey joined the party! We all got
to meet Kelsey for the first time and she fit right in. She was attempting the
marathon the next day and had plans of staying near Jeff and Lauren. Let’s also
add, Lauren is still asleep at this point. That’s alright, she’s a rockstar. We
also met another Lauren, who is one of Chelsea’s friends. She was running her
first 5K so we were all super pumped for her!

So we all chatted for a little, then made our way across the
bridge and to the North Shore for the start. Once we got there, I met Jennifer and was super excited! She recognized me from my #runchat socks. We got some
pictures taken and made our way to the starting corral.

As we were getting in the corral I heard someone say my
name, it was Kristy and I was SO EXCITED!! We have been chatting for months
and it was awesome finally getting to meet her. We met her hubby and mother in
law as well. She was pacing her hubby to a PR. We wished them all the best of
luck and in to corral we went.

I stayed with Matthew in the corral. We both wanted to stay
around an 8:30 or so pace, just to see how things would feel for Sunday. We got
pretty close to the start, but I saw a whole bunch of kids and wanted to not
have to dodge them. We said our good lucks and we were off.

I lost Matthew real early. I saw a lady fall in the middle
of the street. I just wanted to get to a empty space and find a happy pace. The
first little uphill let that happen. I know we are told nothing new on race
days, but since I wasn’t racing this, I decided to give my new handheld water
bottle a try. I really wanted to carry my phone with me. I filled the bottle
with some Cherry Limeade Nuun and really enjoyed it.

I couldn’t believe when my watch went off that a mile has
already gone pass. I looked down and it said 7:55. Wait, what? I’m not pushing
myself at all? What is going on? I better slow down. I saw Kelsey and she looked great.

There was the only water stop at the half way point. As I got
to the water stop, I looked over and saw Jeff! Jeff was going for a faster time
since he would be running the marathon at Lauren’s pace. I screamed and waved,
he waved and we were off. At the same point I saw Jeff, Matthew found me. It
was pretty cool.

Alright, after the water stop there was a pretty decent downhill
to the crossing on the Warhol Bridge. The thing I remember from the first time I
ran this race is the incline on the bridges. I heard my watch go off for the
end of mile 2, 7:52. Alright, I slowed down, but I still felt really good and
was not exerting that much energy.

So once I hit the bridge, I could feel the incline, and I saw
very few people. I ran with a lady for a little while, but lost her on the
incline.

After getting off the bridge, it was a straight shot downtown. My
watch ended up a little off here. About .15 off, which was real strange, but in
any case, it said mile three was 7:32. Hey those are negative splits! When I noticed
I was nowhere near the finish line, I was concerned. There was one final hill
on the Boulevard of the Allies and then I saw the finish. I saw Jeff and he
screamed for me. I was super excited and felt really good still!

I stopped my watch and saw 25:12. That was pretty good! I placed 7th in my age group!! Jeff
placed third in his age group! Matthew finished next and right behind him we
saw Kristy and her newly PRed hubby!!

Chelsea finished next and was super excited to scream about
her over one minute PR!!! We cheered Kelsey and Sarah to the finish line, with
Sarah announcing another new PR!!! Lauren finished strong as well. It was a
pretty awesome race for everyone!

We headed back to Chelsea’s apartment and had doughnuts and
mimosas. We all chatted about traveling, music and running. We watched the kids races from the roof top deck. It was really awesome!

Lauren let us know
that she and MB were at the expo, so we headed over. We needed to save a
doughnut for Lauren for her finish at Big Sur. When we saw Lauren, we screamed and jumped up and down. Then the hugs and all the congratulations, plus the doughnut which may have been the highlight.

We saw Chelsea’s “boyfriend” again and I was crying laughing
because everyone could all see this now. We headed back over to the Akron Marathon booth so we could
get a whole group photo.

After a few more visits around, we parted ways for the day.
I was ready to head home and get ready for Sunday. Lauren was staying downtown
so we had a 6am meeting at the hotel Sunday morning.

So nice to finally meet you in person, even if it was only briefly. I bought our 5K photos, and had them add that group photo of us above (since I'm turned sideways, they didn't have it in my photos), so I'll share it with everybody once I get the email. :)